There is more data out on the local schools. This data is from the Pennsylvania Value Added Assessment System. Here is the article:

PVAAS Scores Rise

I think that this is good news. I fear, however, that something is amiss or that data is clouding analysis. This data seems to me to be asking better questions than the No Child Left Behind assessments. It is looking at whether students move at an acceptable pace academically annually. If a school moves your child forward more than a year's worth of work, then you are receiving "value added." I think this is a sensible way to measure things, but there is one grave flaw. It is all based on whether the standards are good and whether the rate of progress set properly. There is no proof of this in the article.

I really worry when some data (SAT scores nationally, PSSA scores, etc.) point in one direction and another result (this one) says that almost everyone is doing a good job. Sometime is amiss. As a more than causal observer, anything that hides this fact: Education is broken in our country--not in every particular, but in general--and papering over the problems is both counter productive and wicked. It is like giving a cancer patient aspirin and sending them home. Times are desperate this result says that they are not. The problem is that the future is at stake...a future which is highly competitive. This future is not going to pat our kids on the back. It is going to, for most of them, run flat over them. There won't be enough pats on the back and positive comments to salve the pain then. We need repentance not flattery!